The Shanghai University of Medicine and Health Sciences is a new municipal medical university formed from the merger of the Shanghai Institute of Health Sciences, the Shanghai Medical Instrumentation College, and the Shanghai Academy of Health Sciences. For the past six decades, these schools have achieved national acclaim for their distinctive training of medical professionals and personnel. SUMHS has been honored with national recognition for the promotion of public health and for the training of outstanding nurses and medical equipment engineers. Within the fields of Chinese clinical medicine, medical technology and equipment, and related disciplines, it has cultivated generations of highly skilled students and has made crucial contributions to Chinese healthcare.

The school is the first to have 4 affiliated hospitals; in addition, SUMHS has many other teaching hospitals. It also has more than 10 national and Shanghai-municipal public training bases. It maintains a close cooperative relationship with hundreds of high-level medical service agencies, medical equipment enterprises and inspection agencies in all areas of the health care field. The school also carries out extensive international cooperation and student/teacher exchanges with well-known colleges and universities from the United States, Britain, Germany, Japan and dozens of other countries and regions. It has established stable long-term cooperative agreements which allow it to add tremendous value to student experiences. Many colleges and universities at home and abroad participate in the training program entitled ’A Fast Track to Associate’s Degree, Bachelor's Degree and Master’s Degree, ‘ which offers a barrier-free, high-level promotion space for personalized development of the students in the school.

The International Education College of SUMHS was established in 2004. Faced with the global shortage of nurses, the college leadership created the International Exchange College in cooperation with a number of overseas partners, just as other organizations in Shanghai have pursued a diverse international plan. In the years since its inception, the college has established extensive partnerships with institutes from more than ten countries throughout North America, Europe, Asia, and Oceania  The educational philosophy – combining Chinese and international methods, research, equipment, and approaches under the management of experienced global healthcare specialists – has been tremendously successful, and is demonstrated not only in student results, but in international faculty and student exchange programs, textbook publishing, and cooperative and bilingual teacher training.

The college has conducted an active international student exchange program for more than ten years. In the academic year 2016-2017, it will host nearly 200 international students of both degree & non-degree programs from the USA, Japan, Norway, the Netherlands, Finland, and Denmark with medically related majors such as clinical medicine, pharmacology, nursing, laboratory science, dental nursing, and nursing assistance.

The college will continue to carry out international student exchange programs, accelerate the pace of exchange and cooperation expansion by working with overseas student enrollment institutes, set up a recruiting website, and establish new partnerships in order to develop degree programs for international students. The number of international students will be increased by as much as 30% annually in the next 5 years. The average recruitment will reach 250 a year. SUMHS will continue to focus on internationalizing its educational approach by pursuing high-quality teaching resources and innovative approaches to student learning, both in faculty and student experience. As a result, the school’s international reputation will grow and it will emerge as a first-class Chinese medical university.